The Official Vortec 454 Info thread

Supercharged111 said:

I did just the opposite: put a 320 in the tank and kept stock wiring.

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I was originally going to do a Walbro pump, but due to time and money constraints I had to go with an AC Delco.

BNielsen said:

I was originally going to do a Walbro pump, but due to time and money constraints I had to go with an AC Delco.

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My 1500 has a OE pump and keeps up with the blower. They get it done.

Carlaisle said:

Although plastic, the fuel rail is remarkably durable. There's no need to replace it. It's available aftermarket if you do need it. The 502 fuel rail will work, but it's not plug and play. What kind of mileage are you hoping to achieve? You're not likely to see much better than 10 in city driving.

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Where did you find them from aftermarket? Just curious, I managed to get one off eBay that's in good shape but it took me 2 hours of googling, parts store calls, and calling GM. Never found anything new. As far as the 502 rail, I heard you need a different FPR but I've heard it does work...but again, could not find one.

Erik the Awful said:

The average dealership technician stays in the field four years. They're pumping them through Vo-Tech schools as fast as they can, but once they're at a dealership they get shafted at every turn. It doesn't take long for them to jump ship. Dealerships used to be the place where you went to get the most professional service, but now it's beginning technicians whose experience has been pipelined into one speciality.[/rant]

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Volvo truck dealership tech here, can confirm. We get reamed so many ways it's not funny. Literally my last day tomorrow

Good luck on your next venture! I went to work in a union shop on a government contract. The first week a coworker told me, "You ought to be glad you're on night shift so you don't see all the backstabbing on day shift!"

I said, "Oh, crap. Is somebody's job at stake?"

He looked shocked, "Oh, no, nothing that bad."

I started laughing - I'd just been laid off from the dealership because "we had a bad month". My service writer threw me under the bus to save his own job. I've never reconsidered leaving the dealership technician business. It was a 30% cut in pay, but a 90% cut in stress. Sometimes I have nightmares where I have to go back.

Erik the Awful said:

Good luck on your next venture! I went to work in a union shop on a government contract. The first week a coworker told me, "You ought to be glad you're on night shift so you don't see all the backstabbing on day shift!"
I said, "Oh, crap. Is somebody's job at stake?"

He looked shocked, "Oh, no, nothing that bad."

I started laughing - I'd just been laid off from the dealership because "we had a bad month". My service writer threw me under the bus to save his own job. I've never reconsidered leaving the dealership technician business. It was a 30% cut in pay, but a 90% cut in stress. Sometimes I have nightmares where I have to go back.

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Thanks! Looking forward to it. I totally understand the nightmares! Took me two years to jump ship. Took my bro 10+, he warned me. I'll be going to union too with city government so should be better.

Well then,

Back on topic, does any one know if Fast injectors are any good. Haven't found a lot of info on them. They're obviously high performance parts. The smallest injector they have for our l29's is a 33# injector with the minitimer style connector. Any input? I feel like that would be too big for what I need. But is this something the computer will learn or will I need a retune right away? My issue is I don't have the spare cash to do everthing at once but the injectors are leaking I'm pretty sure. So I'm gonna replace them. I'll be doing a 0411 swap in the near future and I'm gonna put headers and cam at some point down the road. As I stated before I'm not trying make this truck fast I just want better power with a focus on low end torque for towing. I'm also not looking to scrafice I ton of efficiency.

Any thoughts or concerns?

If you go with a bigger injector, you'll immediately need a retune.

ThaEdge said:

Well then,

Back on topic,

Words...

Any thoughts or concerns?

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33# injectors are going to be narly big... but how big of a cam are you going? Mild? In the middle? ZZ502?

It'd probably be money -well spent on a smaller size, but at least you'll have all the fuel capacity you'd ever want. I'd suggest 28#. I don't have a cam, but I have a 0411, it definitely drinks all the gas it wants when I accelerate. And I've seen around 60% duty cycle max I think (I'd have to look at some logs).

But you'll need at least a tune to tell the computer what they're flowing. The ECU will not pull more than a certain percentage on long and short term fuel trims before it gives up and it'll give you a DTC.

I'd recommend dipping your toes in HP tuners, unless you got a tune shop close that'll help you and and give you discounted reflashes of the ecu

Mangonesailor said:

33# injectors are going to be narly big... but how big of a cam are you going? Mild? In the middle? ZZ502?

It'd probably be money -well spent on a smaller size, but at least you'll have all the fuel capacity you'd ever want. I'd suggest 28#. I don't have a cam, but I have a 0411, it definitely drinks all the gas it wants when I accelerate. And I've seen around 60% duty cycle max I think (I'd have to look at some logs).

But you'll need at least a tune to tell the computer what they're flowing. The ECU will not pull more than a certain percentage on long and short term fuel trims before it gives up and it'll give you a DTC.

I'd recommend dipping your toes in HP tuners, unless you got a tune shop close that'll help you and and give you discounted reflashes of the ecu

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I believe 25% is the max it'll pull?

Either way, looks like 28s will support roughly 450 hp @ 90% DC so they should be good to go.

@ThaEdge I would personally limp it along on the potentially leaky injectors until you can afford to tune it right away.

Hey guys! So after the injectors and FPR (and front hubs and shocks) I took a maiden voyage to the blue ridge mountains last weekend. She did AWESOME, about 400 miles total with long duration highway speeds and lots of hills. I got a single check engine light on the way home when I pushed it hard going up a hill and it downshifted to 3rd and hit about 4000 RPM. There was no changes in performance but I still freaked out about it for the last 45 minutes of the drive home. It ended up being a P0154, bank 2 upstream o2 sensor. I learned that autozone now only has this wonky code reader that won't reset codes, and it ended up clearing before I could find a place to reset it. I'm wondering if the off brand 93 ethanol blend gas I used (compared to the ethanol free 89 I have used religiously) had anything to do with it. Speaking of octane...

I'm really close to getting an Autocal and tune from Blackbear. I've been emailing with them a bit and they said that the Autocal will work with my 1998 truck. I was surprised to hear that they "do not recommend running non ethanol fuel, as the engine pings far more on non ethanol fuel than on fuel with 10% ethanol". I've heard "old timers" (my father included [emoji1787]) tell me that ethanol fuel in older engines is the devil, but these guys are the professionals so... I guess I'll start using 93 octane top tier fuel and see if I can tell a difference.

I know a lot of you guys are heavy into the 0411 pcm swap, but for what I'm looking for I think the juice on that might not be worth the squeeze (and risk of me royally screwing up my truck). I'm in a weird spot having a 1998 that CAN be autocal'd and haven't found any mention of people doing it for the 454. Does anybody have any experience with Autocal email tuning a 1998 black box or is everyone here all in on the 0411 swap?

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